ST. LOUIS (KMOX) - If you ask many St. Louisans to name a monumental year in city's long history, 1904 would likely come to mind for the World's Fair and the Olympics.
But for Christopher Alan Gordon, the director of library and collections for Missouri Historical Society, you can't beat 1849.
"The thing about 1849 is you have all these different events that come together and create, you might say, the perfect storm," explains Gordon. "A cholera epidemic, the Great Fire happened that year, you have all these people streaming into the city, whether immigrants or people streaming westward."
It was the year of fire, plague, pestilence and death.
The population in just a few years had exploded, increasing by almost 375%. The city's water system and sanitation couldn't keep up. Wooden buildings were being slapped up quickly on narrow streets, all close together. The city was thriving, but setting itself up for some disastrous conditions that all came together in 1849.
Gordon is the author of "Fire, Pestilence and Death: St. Louis, 1849." He'll expand on the subject Sunday, February 2nd when he kicks off the Tower Grove Park Lecture Series. It's a free talk at 3 p.m. in the Ridgway Visitors Center at Missouri Botanical Garden.
In 2020, we are talking about flu epidemics and the spread of coronavirus. But in 1849 as cholera was claiming victims left and right, Gordon says people were still years away from understanding germ theory. They had no idea what was causing the devastating illness. Gordon says it spread terror and was a worldwide pandemic.
"People had all these very bizarre ideas about what actually caused cholera. Some of the treatments and some of the methods used to try to eradicate it were actually more dangerous than the disease itself," says Gordon.
Add to that, the devastating Great Fire that wiped out much of the city. One building that did survive was the Old Cathedral downtown. Gordon says firefighters worked hard to save it because, although it was very new and in the midst of the blaze, it was already a point of pride for the city.
There was some good to come out of a terrible year of 1849. Gordon says the city really made efforts to modernize by cleaning up the city's water system and sewage, clearing garbage out of the streets and rebuilding in the brick for which St. Louis is now famous.
